Alienation of Richard Wright

Alienation of Richard WrightIn Black Boy, Richard Wright portrays the accepted, cruel behavior towards blacks in the Jim Crow South. He was treated as an outcast by white people, some black people, and even most of his own family. They didn’t accept him because he wouldn’t conform to their idea of how he should act or what he should think. Richard was strong-willed and lived by his own beliefs. There were many ways he was set apart from everyone else throughout the entire story. He refused to read the speech that the principal gave him instead of his own, even if it meant not graduating. He stood up for what he believed in, unlike most of his peers, who at this time in history just did whatever they were told to do. He is also treated differently by his peers because of how he did not act like a black person was expected to at that time. It was troubling for Richard to understand that he was supposed to just take any abuse that was inflicted upon him by a white person. Another example of how he stuck out, even in his family, is when he just refuses to take part in their religion. His grandmother constantly is trying to get him to join the church. He attempts to feel like his family does about it but he just can’t seem to, so he gives up on trying to understand.

Richard Wright thought for himself. He chose not to conform but to take his own route and not care what other people told him. There are many individuals who do this today and they are rejected by people because they are different. People that rise up against what society tells them they can and can’t do and make their own way towards their goals are the ones who are remembered.

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...attitude towards the whites changed. in the beginning Richard didn’t see the whites as being very different from the blacks. He also didn’t see how his grandmother could be called “white”, but not be considered white. Richards attitude toward the whites didn’t start to change until the day he started working for the white man and his son at the clothing store. While working at the store one day Richard saw the boss and his son drive up in there car with a frightened black woman who sat between them. The boss and his son drug and kicked at the woman to get her into the store so that they could beat her. After being beaten the woman came out of the store bleeding, crying, stumbling, and holding her stomach. When the woman got to the sidewalk she was immediately grabbed and accused of being drunk. When Richard went back into the store his boss and his son were washing there hands at the sink, and cleaning the blood, wisps of hair, and bits of clothing from the floor. When they looked at Richard they saw that he was shocked. The boss slapped him on the back and said “Boy, that’s what we do to niggers when they don’t pay their bills.” (180) Richards view of the whites started to changed when he not only witnessed the misbehavior of the whites but when he himself experienced it. Richards experience happened when he was sent by his boss to deliver a package. On his way back to town...

...Literary Distinctions through Ineradicable Scars
His racial status, his poverty, the disruption of his family, and his faulty education allowed RichardWright to grow into a novelist astonishingly different than other major American writers. RichardWright was born on a Rucker plantation in Adams County, Mississippi. He was born on September 4, 1908 to Ella Wilson, a schoolteacher and Nathaniel Wright, a sharecropper. When Wright was about six years old, his father abandoned Ella and his two sons in a penniless condition to run off with another woman. This left Wright’s mother the difficult task of supporting herself and her children on her own, but left Wright with a humiliating kind of loss (Duffus).
Soon after his father left, Wright and his mother moved to Memphis, Tennessee. His mother was forced to work as a cook in order to support the family; and during this period, Wright temporarily stayed in an orphanage. Wright’s mother became ill while living in Memphis, so the family moved to Jackson, Mississippi, and lived with Ella’s mother. His grandmother was a Seventh Day Adventist so she enrolled him in a Seventh Day Adventist school at the age of twelve. Wright went to a local public high school for a few years, but did not receive a higher-level education (Duffus).
In 1925, he moved back to Memphis, Tennessee. He worked at...

...become victims. In the novel Black Boy RichardWright explores the struggles throughout his life has been the victim of abuse from his coworkers, family, and his classmates, due to this he is able to return his pain and he becomes a victimizer.
Wright depicts the victimizing tendencies of the members of his dysfunctional family. In the beginning Wright a first notice something is wrong with his family when his father goes to work and never comes back. This instance confused Wright making him unstable and untamed without restrictions. The next time Wright sees his father is during court when his mother was asking him to pay child support. This is the moment that Wright feels resentment for his father when he sees his father smiling throughout the court conflict while his mother was crying. Another occasion where Wright becomes a victim is when his mother makes Wright to accompany her to ask his father for money. When they were ready to ask his father for the money they found him with another woman getting "comfortable". As Wrights' mother asks for the money his father laughs at them and says he doesn't have any money. When the woman that his father is with looks at Wright she says Wright was cute and that his father should give him something. This causes Wright to become embarrassed...

...Outline
Caleb Luthringer
Thesis: RichardWright was an African-American author in the early 1900’s with a
terrible back-ground but a bright future.
I. Personal Life
A. Birth: September 4, 1908.
B. Education: Richard only received a ninth grade education.
C. Marriage: First wife, Dhimah Meadman, August of 1939. Second wife, Ellen Poplar, March 12, 1941.
II. Professional Life
A. In 1927, Wright made it to Chicago. He showed his poetry to Abraham Aaron and Bill Jordan. They got his writing career started.
B. In 1938, Wright began working on his first novel and on March 1, 1940, Native Son was published. Five years later in 1945, his next bestseller, Black Boy, was published.
III. Conclusion: Contribution to Society
A. RichardWright became the very first African-American author in U.S. history to write two best-seller books.
B. Richard even has works that were published after his death in 1960.
Concluding Statement: With Richard Wright’s book: Black Boy and other works, he has
touched the lives of many by showing how something good can come from nothing.
Caleb Luthringer
English II Honors
14 February 2013
RichardWright: From Hunger to Fame
RichardWright was an African-American author in the early 1900’s with a terrible background but a bright future....

...Black Boy by RichardWright Summary
November 25, 2012
Black Boy is an autobiography of RichardWright who grew up in the backwoods of Mississippi. He lived in poverty, hunger, fear, and hatred. He lied, stole, and had rage towards those around him; at six he was a "drunkard," hanging about in taverns. He was surrounded on one side by whites who were either indifferent to him, pitying, or cruel, and on the other by blacks who resented anyone trying to rise above the common people who were slaves or struggling.
The book opens with Richard who is 4 years old at the time, who is required by his mother to sit still and quiet while his grandmother lays in the next room very sick. Richard is bored and sticks a broom in the fireplace then touches it to the curtains, which leads to his accidentally burning down the family home in Natchez, Mississippi. Scared for his life, Richard hides under the burning house. His father, Nathan, retrieves him from his hiding place. Then, his mother, Ella, beats him so severely that he loses consciousness and becomes ill.
Nathan (Richard’s father) abandons the family to live with another woman while Richard and his brother, Alan, are still very young. Without Nathan’s financial support, the Wrights fall into poverty and hunger. Richard closely associates his family’s hardship—and particularly their...

...
Richard Wright’s novel Black Boy is an autobiography that depicts the life of a black male growing up in the early 20th century. One of the biggest factors contributing to the man Wright became were influences by society. Society played a huge role in developing Wright as an author and as a person. Examples of these societal factors include: race, educational opportunities, gang and ghetto life, and the attraction of Paris to African American writers of the 20th century. These collective bearings helped shape RichardWright into one of the most influential African American writers of all time.
Just as it is today, where one resides has an enormous impact on educational opportunities. Because a predominantly large number of African American families live in poor areas, their children attend underfunded schools. In the novel Wright’s poor economic status limited his and many other black’s educational opportunities. Still, Wright understood the value of education: “schooling was more important than the knowledge of a particular subject”(Vogel). When poverty over ruled schooling and Richard could not attend for periods of time, he would teach himself. “I went to school, feeling that my life depended not so much upon learning as upon getting into another world of people” (Wright).
Wright grew up in a segregated...

... Richard Wright’s “The Library Card”
“The Library Card” was a powerful story that showed how reading can influence and affect its readers. While I was reading this story, I was forced to think about how horribly African Americans were treated and the struggles they had to face. To me, this means that it sparked his curiosity on the meaning of life, questions about fate, and even examining his own life. I believe RichardWright was trying to make sense of the meaning of life and the purpose of his own way of living. I began to notice Wright was trying to find the reasoning for racial segregation and the judging of one’s character based on race, religion, and even his way of life.
At the age of eighteen, RichardWright was soon drawn to H. L. Mencken because of a newspaper headline which stated “Mencken is a fool.” To me, this symbolizes Wright’s urge for knowledge and his questioning behind racial segregation. I wondered, just as Wright did, what did Mencken do to cause the South to have such hatred toward not only to Richard, but the African American population as a whole. I believe that he was eager to gain knowledge and figure out an explanation on why the South’s racial tension was so present at this time.
As Wright made the suggestion of borrowing a library card from the...

...﻿Jennifer Abbate
Wright Letter
March 21, 2014
Dear Jennifer Abbate,
You are starting college in the CUNY Start program. Getting an education is never easy, and this will not be easy. That’s because you’re not open-minded to things. But it will be worth it because you are there to pursue your dreams. Your goal is to not to feel embarrassed when you speak right? So I want to remind you about my story, and give you some advice as you begin.
I was born in the segregated south, and I wanted to spread my knowledge through books. It was a big deal in the south for African Americans to read because well we weren’t allowed to enter the library. So how on earth do you think I checked out books from the library? There were many obstacles that I’ve went through just to read. It was hard because what white person would want to help a black boy such as me? Luckily, Mr. Faulk wasn’t against me. He was on my side. He saw where I was coming from and helped me out. After I read my first book, it had me in my own world. So I started to read more. The more I read the more I spread my knowledge through books; it was an amazing experience that I never thought I could feel. My love towards books spread.
From my point of view, I say do whatever you think is the best advice for yourself. I risked my life doing something for myself that I’ve never thought I would imagine. If you have a desire or dream for something you’ve never thought you would have and you want to chase...